Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Parolin said on Thursday that "it's important to dialogue even within the Church", in response to a letter from a group of conservative Catholics accusing Pope Francis of heresy.
"People who disagree express their dissent, but on these things we have to reason, to try to understand one another," he said, speaking on the sidelines of a conference on Iraqi Christians held by ACS, a Vatican-based international non-profit that aids persecuted Christians worldwide.
The letter accused Pope Francis of heresy in his 2016
document Amoris Laetitia - The Joy of Love
The conservatives Catholics delivered to the pope in August
issuing him a "filial correction" - a measure they said was
being using for the first time since the 14th century - over the
document, which opens up the possibility of divorced and civilly
remarried Catholics receiving communion.
Among the signatories is Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, the former
president of the Vatican bank, the Institute for Religious Works
(IOR).
The letter accuses the pope of seven "heretical positions
about marriage, the moral life, and the reception of the
sacraments, and has caused these heretical opinions to spread in
the Catholic Church".
The signatories said their initiative does not conflict with
the Catholic dogma of papal infallibility "since the Church
teaches that a pope must meet strict criteria before his
utterances can be considered infallible.
"Pope Francis has not met these criteria," it added.
The conservatives also accused the pope of having Modernist
leanings and of being influenced by the ideas of Martin Luther.
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